The Beat March 2003

The Shining
Director: Stanley Kubrick

Everyone has a story to tell, especially about how and why they're here teaching in Korea. I know one guy who is certain that the polar caps are melting and the end of the world is forthcoming, presumably set to coincide with the end of the Mayan calendar in 2012. So instead of pining his last few years away in an office cubicle somewhere in North America, he has decided to teach a year at a time in Korea, save all he earns and then travel and scuba dive throughout Southeast Asia. Whenever he runs out of cash he comes back to Korea and starts again.

By contrast, the gentleman next to me on my initial Seoul-Pusan flight back in '96 had a slightly different agenda for taking work here in Korea. I believe his exact wording was that he was here to “kick heroin and meet a lady.” He was here for a week, mostly spent drinking soju and complaining about the heat, before leaving for parts unknown.

Most of us seem to have far more conventional reasons than either of these two for having come here to work. You spent 4-6 years in college, perhaps graduated, then got a job having absolutely no relation to your field of study. You paid bills but found little or no time to do the things you truly longed to do with your life, such as write. Or travel. Or shoot heroin.

This inevitably brings us to The Shining.

How, you ask? Because back in the 70's, when people wanted to pursue their personal passions and still keep a job, Korea wasn't an option. People like Jack Torrance, the main character in The Shining, who wanted to write a novel and still make ends meet, had to take whatever work they could get that filled both the need to live life fully and pay the piper.

It‘s tough working here in Korea sometimes. They cut AFN. There‘s no decent Mexican food. The 3a.m. mosquitoes in your ears for months on end. There‘s no toilet paper anywhere but at home. But if you think hogwan work is a bitch, try getting snowed in for six months at a haunted hotel with blood pouring out of the elevators and a kid with a talking finger riding around all the time on a Big Wheel.

The Shining was written by the prolific Stephen King and adapted deftly for the screen by Diane Johnson and the late Stanley Kubrick. I don't use words like "genius" very often, but in Kubrick's case there is no other fit description. He didn‘t direct often (thirteen movies, not counting A.I., which Spielberg completed for him after his death), but when he did, it was usually magic. Lolita, Dr. Strangelove, 2001, A Clockwork Orange, Full Metal Jacket -- just to name a few. The point is, his movies rock.

Whether you‘re creating a wedding video or making a feature length film, someone has to decide what you‘re going to see, hear, and eventually feel. That person is the director. It takes about one year to weave a square foot of silk carpet, yet even the Taj Mahal doesn‘t have tapestries as rich and vibrant as the vision Kubrick brings to the much-maligned horror genre with The Shining. Two examples:
1) The steadicam shots

When you watch this movie, you‘ll immediately catch that the hotel itself is a formidable character in the film. It‘s huge, and the way that you meet the horrors and evils is by floating silently along the corridors to the point of action, as if you are a ghost drifting to and fro in the hallways. This, along with a myriad of other shining moments -- like the opening-credit drive to the hotel, the perfect symmetry of the two girls, and the naked chick velvet paintings in Scatman Cruthers‘ motel room -- are pure Kubrick. The eyes and vision he gives you through his camera lens are far more telling and unique than your own and it leaves you wanting more.

2) The mics in the Big Wheel wheels

Another wicked part comes from having this kid ride his Big Wheel all over the hotel when they first get there. As the steadicam follows close behind, you hear the overbearing sound of the wheels racing, then becoming muted by the intermitted carpets. Even now it‘s considered an audio masterpiece for its ingenuity as well as for its ability to create tension.

And then there's Jack Nicholson. If you ever watch the Oscars and wonder why everyone is constantly kneeling down to kiss Jack Nicolson's ass ad infinitum, this is why. Together with his work in Chinatown, One Flew Over The Cukoo's Nest and Prizzi‘s Honor, Jack‘s performance in The Shining is the stuff of legend.

His degeneration from a mild-mannered guy in a suit at the job interview to the infamous “Here‘s Johnny!” psychopath with an axe is compelling because it‘s so easy to see how it could happen. Ever gone on a diet, or had to study, or quit smoking, or drinking, or mainlining heroin, and then had to spend time with someone for a while who you wanted nothing to do with? Nicholson 's portrayal of Jack Torrance is the ultimate personification of your collective misplaced angst. He fills the screen with a host of emotion, especially by using his eyes. Even though he has some supernatural nudges along that mad path and no doubt goes those extra few steps over the line that you (probably) didn‘t, the resultant onscreen tension and genuine horror it creates is as realistic as it is powerful.

In summary, this is a no-brainer. You‘ve no doubt heard of this movie and probably have already watched it before. So what – it‘s 100 times better than almost anything else available and most Korean video shops have it. Plus, if you ever had a little brother or sister who bugged the shit out of you on a long car ride to Florida, or a roommate you loathed, or you've been married, then I suggest you watch The Shining immediately. For some it's horror. But in your case, it may be therapeutic.

Note 1: Kubrick was also the guy behind the camera on Spartacus, at the time the biggest movie ever made ($12M) but got screwed out of the credit.

Note 2: Shelly Duvall is also fantastic as the much-maligned wife, who has to deal with all the wackiness in this film. She has Jack as a husband, a kid who talks to his finger and writes backwards in the mirror, and her mailing address is a nightmare hotel. Her expressions of exhausted, sweaty horror are classic and without them all of Jack‘s marvelous anger would be empty amd useless.

Note 3: It does not get better than Scatman Crothers in that motel room on vacation. If any of you ever see reprints of either of those paintings feel free to buy it for me and send it my way for a handsome reward.

Note 4: Dig the ’picture perfect” ending…

Note 5: Also recommended, The Shinning, The Simpsons parody of the movie from the 1994 Halloween Special where Homer goes mad due to no beer and no television.

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